Today's safety systems for motor vehicles comprise a large plurality of actuators, for example airbags, but also seat belt pretensioners, roll bars or protective equipment for pedestrians. The requirement for triggering and the desired triggering time period are determined by using sensor signals in the control unit. The actuators are triggered thanks to electrical impulses and the energy supply, wherein the quantity of energy required for this and the length of time between the individual actuators can differ and, across the large plurality of actuators, in total, if the actuators are triggered simultaneously, exceeds all of the available energy in the energy source, for example an interconnected ignition capacitor.
For this reason, the triggering is usually carried out in groups having a maximum group size.